Disclaimer: I don't own Castle.

"What are you into Becks?"

Kate hadn't even had time to say hello when she picked up her office phone before the question hit her ears. She immediately recognized the voice as that of her former best friend Tina Sorenson. It had been years since they had spoken. Sleeping with your boyfriend has that sort of effect on a relationship. It wasn't until Kate's curiosity got the best of her she called her old friend to get information on one Richard Castle.

"Curiosity?" She rolled her eyes at herself. It was a lot more than curiosity to make her call Tina. "I'm not into anything. I had an operation that crossed paths with this person. I was trying to find out what I could about him. Why?"

"Because I got pulled into the Colonel's office to explain my interest in comparted classified information. All I did was pull up his service record, which doesn't have anything by the way, and I tripped some sort of flag."

Kate winced. Tina and she certainly had their differences, but she didn't want to torpedo her career. "Sorry. I didn't know it would cause that kind of trouble. They aren't pulling your clearance or anything are they?"

"No. I didn't look at anything that isn't publically available so I'm good, but they are watching this Richard Rogers file very closely."

"Well thanks for trying." Kate made to end the call.

"Wait. After talking to the Colonel I asked around. I still owe you for what I did. For hurting you like that." Her voice sounded small and sad.

Kate was shocked by the unprompted apology.

"I found a couple of Staff Sergeants who were here during the time you asked about. Apparently a task force was put together of operators from all four branches at the time. There were sort of a trouble shooting group. Shooting being the operative word. This group went to the worst parts of the world at the worst times."

"Holy crap!" Beckett exclaimed.

"Yeah. I was told in no uncertain terms to drop any other questions I had and walk away. Whatever this was, it's dead and buried, and no one is ever going to bring it back."

"Thanks Tina. I really appreciate it."

"Your welcome. This is the closest you've ever come to letting me apologize."

Beckett didn't know what to say into the awkward silence.

"Take care Becks."

"You too, Tina."

Kate had been staring at the notes she had jotted down during the phone call for almost twenty minutes when Lanie entered her office.

"Well?" The doctor lowered herself down into a chair opposite the desk. Seeing that her friend was lost in thought she cleared her throat.

Kate's eyes leapt to her friend's face.

"What did you find out?" Lanie prompted.

"Nothing. Something?" She didn't look up from her notes.

"It can't be both." Lanie responded.

"Tina got flagged for looking at his service record. Got pulled into the Colonel's office. Asked what her interest was."

"A Colonel got involved in a service records request?" Lanie leaned forward in the chair. "That's unusual."

"Yeah. She said the records didn't have anything more than what I already knew. After that, Tina asked around. Found some old timers that said he was part of some supper hush hush secret squirrel group that did things they weren't ever going to talk about."

"Maybe you should leave this alone." Lanie offered.

"What?" Kate was momentarily speechless. "Leave it alone? This coming from 'Miss I'm in everyone's business all the time'."

Lanie narrowed her eyes at her friend. "This is different. Secrets like this don't react well to the light of day. Whatever this group was, whatever Mr. Castle did, a lot of people want to keep it quiet. Maybe it's better that way."

Rick was busily avoiding writing by playing a vigorous game of Madden against a twelve year old from Washington State.

"Oh Come On!" He screamed as another one of his passes fell directly into the hands of his opponent. He was so engrossed in the epic loss he almost didn't answer the ringing phone.

"Castle." He said without looking at the screen.

"What the hell have you done son?"

The controller clattered to the floor forgotten.

"Nothing." He answered defensively until his legendary curiosity got the best of him. "Why?"

"Because a Captain Sorenson down at SOCOM just did a search for you through the military database. She also put out feelers through the grapevine. Now, why would an Army Captain be asking about a Marine Master Gunny that got out five years before she showed up at West Point?"

What Rick meant to says was 'I don't know'. What came out instead was "You're Deputy Director of Central Intelligence. Don't you know?"

Castle winced into the silence from the other end of the phone.

"Do you want me to have you assassinated?"

"Try it." Castle answered defiantly.

"You aren't James Bond. I wouldn't send Ivonna Onetop." The senior man thought for a moment. "More like Fat Bastard from Austin Powers." His father chuckled.

"That's cold." Castle frowned into the phone.

"Seriously though, nothing springs to mind?" His father prompted again.

Suddenly a thought clicked. "Javi's people know I was in the military. It came out during the mess over in the Ukraine. Nothing specific obviously, but they know I met him while I was in the Marines."

"I'll look into it." The senior man's voice changed. "How is she?"

"Not as bad as I feared but not as well as I hoped. Talking to Kate helped. Talking to a therapist is helping as well."

"Is there anything I can do?"

"You could try to sneak a visit. I know this isn't the best time, but it would be nice."

"There is way too much publicity around you right now. I'm frankly surprised our relationship hasn't already leaked."

"I pay people millions of dollars to make sure things like that don't happen." Castle responded.

"I pay people billions to do the same. Doesn't mean it won't happen eventually." He sighed.

"Would it be so bad?"

"For me?" The old man asked. "No. I'm old. I'm close to retirement. All my enemies are dead or retiring themselves. You on the other hand still have enemies. And a daughter who would like a normal life. Well as normal as she can get with a father like you."

"Gee thanks."

The elder man chuckled at his son. "Alright. I'll look into this. If you think of anything give me a call. Bye Richard."

"Bye dad."

"What have you done?" Jim Beckett shut the door to his daughter's office and sat down in the chair across from her desk.

She looked up from her computer screen and answered defensively. "Nothing."

"Then why am I getting calls from friends saying that the alphabet soup groups are looking into what happened in Kiev? Is there something you aren't telling me? Is there something your Ukrainian friends aren't telling you?"

Kate shook her head. "No. I know that they are criminals, but they wouldn't and didn't do anything to jeopardize me or the company."

"Well something has set off the Jason Bourne set. Your name came up specifically." Jim warned.

Kate's eyes widened as realization settled in. "Shit."

"Shit? What shit?" Her father stared at her waiting for an explanation.

"I called in a favor trying to find out more on Richard Castle. It lead nowhere and got the person doing the search a meeting with her boss's boss."

"Did she give you classified data?"

"No. She didn't find anything. Literally nothing. Just his enlistment papers and his honorable discharge over a decade later."

"I feel a 'but' coming."

Kate sighed. "But she did ask around to some old timers and they told her about a secret squirrel unit doing things total off book for several years that was a made up of members from different branches."

"Drop it Kate." Jim's voice was all business. "We can't operate with the black ops community looking over our shoulder. Whatever is buried in Mr. Castle's past needs to stay that way."

"Understood." He rose from the chair and headed for the door, then turned back abruptly.

"She? Who do you know at…Tina? You contacted Tina about this?"

Kate grimaced and didn't look her father in the eyes.

Jim realized just how obsessed with Richard Castle his daughter really was. "Kate. I'm serious. You have to let this drop. You are risking too much for absolutely nothing here."

"I got it Dad. No more snooping."

As he exited his daughters office Jim Beckett wondered if he was going to have to put a detail on his daughter to start tracking her movements.

"Richard, what did you do?" Martha burst through the door of the loft.

"I sense a pattern forming." Rick muttered to himself. "Did you talk to dad?"

The elder Rodgers was momentarily stunned. "No. Why? What don't I know?"

"It's nothing." Rick waved his hand trying to shoo the subject away. "What are you talking about mother?"

"I'm talking about trying to force your way into that young woman's life as inspirations to write new books."

"How do you know about that?" Castle resisted the urge to put his face in his palms.

"I ran into Gina."

Castle's brow furrowed. "Where would you run into Gina? What could the two of you possibly have in common?"

"If you must know, we had lunch and talked about the possibility of writing a book about my life based on my play."

"You have to be kidding?" Rick couldn't believe he blurted that out. What was wrong with him today?

"No I am not." The matriarch narrowed her eyes at her son. "We even discussed having you as the ghost writer."

"Ghost writer? Of a story mostly at my expense? You can't possibly be serious." Rick decided that the entire world had gone crazy.

"You are contracted to turn out another book. If you can't come up with something new, Gina said my life story would be a perfect way to round out the contract."

Castle put his hands over his face. "Of course she did." Gina had no intention of publishing his mother's biography, but suggesting it was the perfect way to pressure him into doing the next fiction book he was supposed to deliver. The woman really was evil.

"Anyway, that's not what I was getting at. You are attempting to stalk that young woman, who saved your daughter and is even now helping her for your own personal advancement. How can you think that is a good idea?"

"I told you what I was up to, Mother."

"I didn't think you were serious. I thought you were simply getting over your…"

"DON"T SAY IT."

Martha scowled. "Getting over it. I didn't realize that you actually intended to start following these people around and writing about what they do." Her tone became very serious. "Are you thinking about joining their company? You have a daughter, Richard. You left that life behind."

Castle closed his eyes to gather his thoughts. "I did leave that life behind. I'm not joining joining the company. I would just be a tag alone. I simply see a compeling story."

"And it doesn't having anything to do with the incredibly attractive Kate Beckett?"

Castle raised an eyebrow. "Attractive? I hadn't noticed."

"Of course you didn't." Martha raised her own eyebrow. "I assume you have a plan?"

"A plan on how to invade her life." Rick looked at her perplexed.

"Richard, you can't possibly believe that you are going to waltz in there and convince both her and her father to let you turn their business into a public spectacle using nothing but your charm and a smile?"

"Of course not. This is a business arrangement and I'm approaching it as such."

"He wants to what?" Kate asked to be sure she heard her father correctly.

Javi let out a snort at her reaction. She squinted her eyes at him.

"You heard me. He wants to follow you and the team on a couple of different jobs and use it as the basis of his next book." The elder Beckett explained. He could see the conflict his daughter was having. He knew he shouldn't have been taking so much pleasure in it, but so few things left her flustered.

For her part, Kate was a mess of thoughts and emotions. The idea of being the subject of her favorite author's next book was amazing and having him around would definitely give her more time to find out about his past.

On the other hand she didn't like the idea of anybody following her around, especially someone that had already shown a spectacular knack for causing problems and not doing what they were told. She wasn't sure if she was more afraid that her dad would let him in or tell him no.

"So?" She asked.

"I haven't decided yet." He really hadn't. "The publicity would be nice but then again some of what we do doesn't exactly need publicity. There is also the fact that clients may not want to be part of a book, fiction or otherwise."

Javi, knowing his friend, asked what he considered the obvious question. "What is he offering?"

"Twenty percent cash stake in the company plus contacts into the book and movie industry. He's already pointed a few of his friends our way."

"How much is twenty percent?" Javi asked.

"A lot." Kate answered with some awe.

"Also, his publisher will make us their exclusive agency. That will give us a huge presence here and in LA."

"We don't have a presence in LA." Kate pointed out.

"With a twenty percent cash influx and exclusive contract we will." Jim responded.

Javi let out another laugh. "He never did do anything half assed."

"Do I have a choice?" Kate was beginning to think the decision had already been made.

"Of course. Why do you think we are having this meeting? Even though from a business standpoint it is all win, it still feels a little bit like pimping out my daughter for money."

Kate winced. "Can you please not put it that way? It creeps me out." She thought for a minute. "If he wants to be a member lets treat him like a member. We can run him through the crucible and see how he fairs and then go from there." This wasn't just a stall tactic for Kate. Running the author through the crucible would give her a chance to see what he could and could not do and also give an excuse to really dig into his background.

Jim looked at Espo. "Javi?"

"Works for me. Friend or not, we don't need a liability in the field."

Jim leaned back in his chair. "Alright then. We tell Mr. Castle that he has a few hurdles to clear before we agree to anything."

Rick knew that Espo waking him up at 8 AM in the morning by knocking on his door wasn't going to be all good news, but this was more than he expected. He set his coffee down on the counter. "What's the crucible?"

Javi had been elected to tell Castle that a few conditions had to be met before we was going to be allowed to join LGM. Kate has seemed disappointed that it wasn't her, but the boss had been firm.

"Remember SOG qualification?"

"Holy Shit! I'm too old to pull that off again." Castle responded. He had been young and in peek physical condition when he had gone through that and it had still almost killed him.

Javi laughed. "It's nothing like that. A little shooting, and little running. Personality test. That sort of thing."

"What about the background check?" He didn't go into detail about his concerns. Javi would know what he was talking about.

"Mine held up, yours definitely will. I would be more worried about the personality test."

"Ha ha. Very funny. So when do I qualify?" Rick picked is coffee back up.

"When do you want to start?"

"Tomorrow. 6AM."

Javi just shook his head. "6AM? You? I don't believe it. Have you gotten up at 6AM since you got out?"

"Nope."

Kate couldn't believe it. Even holding the target in her hand, she still couldn't believe it. "This was at five hundred yards?"

"Yep." Hal tried to hide his laugh. I watched him do it not an hour ago." He had to admit he was impressed with the repeated hits in the 10 ring.

"Where is he now?" Kate asked.

"He's doing the personality evaluation with doctor head shrinker." Javi answered as he entered the room. "Don't worry, this is one test he can't possibly pass."

"Who's doing the hand to hand qualification?" With the arrival of Jim Beckett, the entire senior staff of LMG was present.

"Not me." Javi answered immediately. Everyone looked at him skeptically. He usually did the close-quarters evaluations. "I don't want anyone saying I played favorites."

"Marcus can do it." Hal answered. Marcus Neroman was Hal's number two. He stood 6' 3" and was 250 lbs. if he was an ounce. As if his physical forms wasn't enough, he studied several different forms of martial and defensive arts.

"I don't want him killed." Jim answered. "He is offering to put a twenty percent stake in the company."

"Marcus wont' hurt him too bad." Hal answered.

"You said not to take it easy on him." Kate responded.

"Marcus definitely won't take it easy on him." Javi agreed.

"Fine." Jim relented. "Tell Marcus to meet force with force. I don't want Mr. Castle laying broken on the floor, but I want him to know this is for real."